BNP in blazers?

The EGM to hopefully vote out Bolton is on 17 February in Birmingham. It will determine whether our party will be the ‘BNP in blazers’ with Mr Bolton as leader, or whether we can finally rid ourselves of this distraction and become the patriotic common sense family-friendly guardians of Brexit for the whole nation.

By the time we were opposing the recent mass immigration from Eastern European countries, it had become almost as toxic a subject as Hitler, because opposition to the 1960’s wave of migrants, who were mostly of non-Caucasian origins, was castigated as being racist, and so all subsequent opposition to migration has been similarly irrationally equated.

Nigel Farage made great efforts to dispel the accusation that Kippers were the ‘BNP in blazers’. Unlike the Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green Parties, there is still a list of racist parties – established during Nigel’s leadership of our party – whose current or past members are precluded from joining UKIP. Our policy of not having face coverings in public was rightly conceived as applying equally to everyone, including motorcyclists not wearing helmets when not riding, for reasons of security/crime prevention, as much as upholding traditional British culture of communication including seeing the whole face as much as spoken words. Thus from having been the only party other than Conservative and Labour in recent times to have won a national election when we won the 2014 Euro’s, the 2017 General Election clumsy and rabidly toxic Ban the Burka policy all but totally wiped out our vote. When Mr Bolton was elected, his Liberal Democrat background quickly repaired this self-inflicted damage.

Thus when the scandal of Henry Bolton and Jo Marney broke, it wasn’t just a married 54 year old going off with a model less than half his age and younger than his first daughter, in the Christmas season. The publication of Jo Marney’s racist texts about the Grenfell Tower deceased and survivors, and insulting Prince Harry’s fiancée Meghan Markle were an absolute gift to UKIP detractors wanting to falsely depict us as racists in disguise – the BNP in blazers.

Frustratingly, nothing was said or done about these toxic texts by Mr Bolton until weeks after they were published, and even now, although he has alleged they were somehow ‘doctored’, there have been no back-up details as to when, how, and by whom; nor publication of the original non-toxic versions of the offending texts.

The feeble protest that they weren’t intended for public consumption doesn’t change what they tell you about the author – even if some were allegedly sent in the context of a humourless twisted dare. A few days after being suspended, Jo Marney resigned her UKIP membership.

Mr Bolton said that had he known about these racist and other equally vile texts, he would not have become involved with Ms Marney, although it’s worth noting that he must have known about them sometime before they were published to have tried to prevent them from being published. Yet having also declared that “our romance is clearly incompatible with my leadership”, Mr Bolton has since repeatedly told the media that he remains in “close contact” . . . “every night”, still loves her and that they may get back together.

A Google search on “Judge a man by the company he keeps” showed the apt Biblical (Old Testament) origin of this phrase: Proverbs 13:20 “He that walks with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.”

With the UK apparently having an increasingly libertarian approach to moral issues and about 50% of UK marriages sadly failing, if his “change of relationship status” had been Mr Bolton’s only personal problem he might well have ridden out the storm and without too much adverse effect on UKIP; particularly if it were outweighed by an already established meaningful presence on the political stage and generally advancing UKIP. But Mr Bolton’s continued association and romance with the author of racist and other disgusting texts now in the public domain means that should he remain leader UKIPpers will once again be accused of being the BNP in blazers and will be lucky to retain a 2% vote share, never mind go beyond regaining lost ground as we need to do to make a meaningful impression on the UK political landscape. Thus anyone voting for Mr Bolton will be the political equivalent of a turkey voting for Christmas.

Don’t be taken in by the pathetic defence that UKIP doesn’t need the cost and disruption of another leadership contest as being a good reason to vote for Mr Bolton as if UKIPpers voting against him will somehow suddenly become responsible for such debacle. This is as ludicrous as a convicted bank robber asking a judge not to jail him as the jails are overcrowded and the thousands of pounds cost of locking him up would be better spent on the NHS.

How ironic that during last year’s leadership contest, Mr Bolton challenged Marie Waters being allowed to stand saying UKIP was in danger of becoming the “UK Nazi party”, and upon being elected proclaimed that he had saved UKIP from this fate.

No wonder it has been reported that emails to the UKIP Head Office are 90% against Mr Bolton.

The only question is how many of these keyboard warriors will manage to make the EGM and vote accordingly. Voting out Bolton is about voting for us not to be labelled as the ‘BNP in blazers’ and to get a worthy leader who can lead the UKIP opposition to the sham Brexit currently being constructed by a bunch of feeble Remoaners on behalf of the 17.4 million Brexit voters.

“not having face coverings in public was rightly conceived as applying equally to everyone, including motorcyclists not wearing helmets when not riding”…
Actually, I’m against forcing people to do things against their will that do not harm others. If you believe in liberty, then you should be free to decide whether or not you take the sensible choice of wearing a seat-belt or a helmet.
In a free society, you should be free to choose. not forced by law. Years ago, I always wore a helmet on my motorcycle and I now always wear a belt in my car, but to be prosecuted if I choose not to, is not in my books, freedom.

Bucky from Bernardshire, fellow Libertarian, careful you don’t get the Farranger or Graham trolls on your tail, there’s a flaw with what you write, no seat belt, personal responsibility and all that, but the more likely the N.H.S. will have to pick up the pieces when things go wrong, and through state extortion I pay for the N.H.S.

Libertarians draw a line at N.H.S. privatisations, except thick ones like Nuttall.

My only comment on your otherwise excellent article is that we did poorly in the last GE because:

1. Paul Nuttall was a busted flush after Stoke and the various revelations about his back story.
2. We only fielded candidates in just over 50% of constituencies
3. The voters decided we’d served our purpose i.e. Brexit
4. Voters, as usual with FPTP were ‘forced’ to choose their worst best option between Labour & the Tories.
5. We had no grassroots campaigning to talk of
6. We had no election budget

The burka/integration agenda never got through to most voters, whether you agreed with it or not – as Immigration spokesman I had to publicly defend the policy during the campaign and was broadly in agreement with its principles and objectives.

Dear John,
I agree that there were the other contributing factors you list but ‘Ban the Burka’ was what Paul Nuttall appeared to bring every interview round onto. As I’ve said in other articles, we need to caress the voters to our common sense viewpoint and policies with compelling words which they will nonetheless consider to be measured and reasonable as otherwise they’ll so over-react that they’ll dive for cover and the message will be drowned out by metaphorically “bashing ’em over the head” with hysterical rhetoric. Passion backed with indisputable facts has been when we’ve been at our best.

Bolton’s final undoing in the Christmas/early 2018 period – somewhat surprisingly to me, given his CV – has been his seeming inability to even begin to think ahead like a good chess player, and objectively think through consequences from a typical voter’s viewpoint, such has been his own self-absorption – never mind really ‘do a Spassky’ (The Russian Grand Master Spassky caused outrage as the first to walk round to his opponent’s side of the board to view the position.)

JOHN
ALso, you do not mention an important factor:
BOTH major Parties LIED THROUGH THEIR TEETH last summer and swore blind that they heeded the result of the referendum; that they would HONOUR it; and they would reduce immigration.

BOTH LAB AND TORIES promised that much.
Now the whole country can see what liars they were and are : I believe there is huge scope for UKIP’s revival.
# Cheat me ONCE ~ Shame on YOU !
Cheat me TWICE ~ Shame on ME !! #

A good LEADER could have been making these points since September ( instead of faffing around about management flim flammery ).

Gerard BATTEN still has room to make these points……………………
( but where is he ?? )

The width is slightly greater than the width of the leaflet. In use you fold the leaflet in half over the pointy blade, and then push the whole thing through the letter box, of course keeping hold of the handle. A hole at the end of the handle and a loop of cord through it around your wrist ensures that you do not drop it through!

So you damage your leaflets before they’ve even landed, and it’ll be slower. If we want people to read UKIP leaflets, you typically have a 2 to 3 second window in which recipients make a ‘ditch’ or ‘read on’ decision. As we all get so much through our letterboxes, given only about 20% vote at local elections it’s reasonable to assume 80% won’t bother to unfold unsolicited leaflets.

So, if you want to do a job properly, and look competent, use the right tool: in this case, Postie Mate! Leaflets are delivered safely without risk of a dog bite from using fingers to get through the otherwise impossible bristles; flat on the mat; and you save up to 1/3rd of your time as house to house delivery is up to 50% faster. Job done.

The bundles of junk mail that gets posted by Royal Mail goes straight in my recycling bin.
Last year, prior to the GE, UKIP East Birmingham used Royal Mail to distribute their election leaflet, I only saw it by chance, tucked up with a Specsavers envelope inside an Iceland leaflet, which was in turn inside a Farm Foods leaflet. The only reason I saw the UKIP leaflet was because I was considering shopping at Farm Foods, so as I opened it up, the UKIP leaflet dropped out.
Other leaflets that get pushed through generally have a chance at least of getting my attention, exactly as you say, a 2 to 3 second window. 😉

UPDATE. The idea (in today’s media) of “Vote Bolton, get Nigel” is laughable, and the sort of twisting and turning expected of the political establishment’s legacy parties which would undermine UKIP’s ethos quicker than you can say ‘knife’. Bolton is toxic and any role for him will result in the return of the “BNP in Blazers” tag.

No! You never go wrong going right: we need to openly do the right thing at each stage, starting with voting out Bolton. If Nigel then wishes to return he can at that stage throw his hat into the ring and we’ll then see whether or not he is opposed, and what happens thereafter.

A pity you didn’t call me to discuss any problems as all I can now say is that “a bad workman blames his tools.”

I delivered over 12K leaflets with my wooden prototypes and the only reason Mini-Postie Mate wasn’t taken on board by Parcelforce after one of their drivers initiated a very small trial, was because of wearability/compatability with their current uniform. In fact someone thought it was so good only 5 of the 6 I provided were returned!

It does work very well in the right hands as many positive reviews on my website confirm. Please call me to discuss your issues.

As you’ll see on the link above, Roger, Postie Mate works whether you’re right or left handed. In fact I sometimes use it left handed if when I get there the layout of the front door/letterbox and surrounding bushes etc will make delivering quicker: you’d expect a pianist to be pretty ambidextrous, wouldn’t you?